Tag Archives: school

Today is ‘Bring Your Teddy Bear to Work and School Day’! We love this idea, after all- who doesn’t love to have their most reliable friend by their side during the day?

Many of you will have already adopted a bear from Crafty Monkey after making your own at a party or just for fun- but if not, pop over to put some love into creating your own little friend to take away with you.

What many children love best about their Build a Bear friends is that they can dress them up in adorable little outfits from our massive range! Transform your hippo into a cheerleader or get your turtle into his cowboy gear and get out and about so they can strutt their stuff in their new togs!

Why not drop by and see all our animals for yourself? They’re all desperate for new homes and somebody to cuddle up to…which one will be lucky enough to be adopted by you?

Thankfully, our studio did not undertake a transformation into a real rainforest…that would have been a disaster for our precious art equipment! But rather, our studio was full of the sunny faces of a group of local school children eager to show us their excellent ‘rainforest’ themed ideas!

The children from years 2 and 3 had been learning about rainforests at school and their latest mission was to paint a creature from the rainforest using a range of art techniques. Their teachers were wise enough to know that the Crafty Monkey team would be the right people to nurture the children’s creative minds! And the pottery painting commenced!

Clutching the designs that they had lovingly created at school, each child was given a plain, square tile. Their aim was to transfer their beautiful pictures of colourful rainforest creatures to pottery…and the end results were amazing!

The children used sponging techniques to start their pieces, creating a lovely mottled effect to reflect the weird and wonderful background scene of the tropical rainforest. They considered the colours that make up a typical scene and took small pieces of sponge to dab away to create their gorgeous green and yellow scenery. They then listened carefully and learned about different brush techniques and how to work with the special pottery paint to bring their animals to life in glorious technicolor!

The children really enjoyed their pottery painting experience and took new skills (and maybe a new hobby) away with them. In the mean time, they’ve been waiting patiently to see their finished articles while the Crafty Monkeys were bustling away to get them glazed and fired.

They produced some fantastic pieces of pottery and we’re sure that when they see them, they will be amazed at how their masterpieces have turned out! We were!

Crafty Monkey love working with schools on projects whether they come to us or we go to them. We also work with PTA’s as we have some great fundraising ideas so get in touch if you would like to find out more!

The end of the school term may seem like a long way in the distance, but before you know it, the summer holidays will be upon us (yay!) and you’ll be thinking about all the wonderful activities that you can get involved with at Crafty Monkey! But have you decided what you’re going to give to your child’s teacher as a ‘thank you’ gift?

If not, then there’s no time like the present to put on your creative thinking caps. Teachers spend their lives getting hands on and creative with your children, so now it’s time to give something back and there really is no better place to start than Crafty Monkey.

We can pretty much guarantee that you’ll find something for every kind of teacher here. We have items starting at £4 with no studio fee which proove popular, we have tea sets for the tea lover, latte cups for the coffee lover, cake stands for the cake lover and trinket pots for the… er…trinket lover! As most of you will know, our studio is bursting at the seams with a huge range of pottery and your creative gift doesn’t necessarily need to painted- remember that you can also decoupage your way into fashioning something lovely for teacher to display!

Or perhaps you want to do a collective gift from all the teachers pupils

– we’ve done lots of great plates, vases and plant pots where the children put a fingerprint on and their name, the fingerprints can be made into all sorts of things – a favourite is where a garden scene is created with fingerprints and inscribed onto the piece is ‘Thanks for helping us grow and bloom!

We can help you with ideas if you pop in and see us at the studio, but we know that many of you and your children create fantastic things independently. From the elaborate masterpiece, to the downright barmy- we’ve seen it all at Crafty Monkey! However, our personal favourite teacher gift from last year has to be a dog bowl painted by a little boy for his canine loving teacher, on which he had inscribed the words ‘Teacher’s Pet’. Full marks to that pupil for inventiveness!

Whether you want to create a unique gift for someone special, have a party to remember for kids of all ages, or something a little more grown up for a stag or hen party, then pottery painting is the fun and creative way to mark an occasion. Perhaps you want something fun to do with the kids at the weekend or in the school holidays – there’s nothing to inspire creativity and artistic passion in a youngster like getting hands-on and making something which they can use at home to remind them of the fun they have had.

It’s a great way to encourage kids to get their hands dirty and appreciate what they can do with their talent and kids love being able to paint something different and choose their own design for a piece of original artwork.Maybe you’d like to create a family treat to give to a loved one? How about a hand painted plate or bowl with a contribution from everyone in the family, whether that’s a personalized message or a tiny hand print. It’s definitely a great way to commemorate a special occasion and create a piece of original art work which is sure to provide years of pleasure and provide wonderful memories for everyone involved.

So why not let loose and try some pottery painting – it’s a great way free the inner child in anyone and an opportunity to add a fantastically unique piece of crockery to your collection. You can paint a pattern, write something special or just go crazy and create something which reminds you of how fun it is to express yourself artistically.

Since 1967, on or around Hans Christian Andersen’s birthday, 2nd April, International Children’s Book Day (ICBD) is celebrated to inspire a love of reading and to call attention to children’s books.

At Crafty Monkey we think that is a fabulous idea and know many of our younger customers enjoy book week at school.

To encourage your child’s love of reading why not bring them along to paint their favourite character onto a plate, mug or practically anything. Children can either use their imaginations to make their characters come to life or we can help and show you how you can replicate an image from a book onto a piece of pottery it is a very easy process with amazing results. Come and try it for yourself.